The choices we face.
A cramp hits—severe—and I bend over, tears forming at the corners of my eyes.
“Ow,” I say, weak and helpless, cradling my stomach.
“Ivy,” Soren gasps. His jaw tightens. “I just wish there was something I could do. There has to be something. You shouldn’t be dealing with this alone.”
“Just sit with me if you want,” I say, feeling sheepish at the suggestion. I really wish I hadn’t woken him. “You don’t have to, though—I know how to deal with this.”
But he doesn’t budge. Just sits with me, his hands steady at my back, fingers pressing slow, deliberate circles. Squeezing my hand as the cramps continue to riddle my body, his grip firming when the pain spikes.
Finally, the pain gives a small respite.
Soren pulls me to my feet, steadying me before reaching for a towel so fluffy I’d find it delicious if I wasn’t in so much pain, drying me with quiet efficiency.
I pull my glamorous period panties on and return to bed, where I miraculously find myself drifting into a restless sleep. Soren watches the entire thing, something unreadable settling behind his eyes.
CHAPTER 46
IVY
Awhile later, I wake to another savage twinge in my abdomen. “Fucking hell,” I cry to myself as a wave of pain rushes over me, brutal and relentless.
“Ivy,” Soren’s voice calls out softly from the hallway. “I’m here for you,” he says. “I’ll be right there.”
Still groggy, I open my eyes. The space is different than when I fell back asleep but, in my fog, I can’t immediately place why.
He comes in holding a tray and a bag, which he places carefully on the dresser behind him. Then he turns to face me. “Here,” he says, already holding out a glass of water and a couple of pills. “Drink. Take these.”
I take the glass and the pills from him. The water is cool as I sip. The pills lodge in my throat and I gag, but manage to choke them down.
He reaches behind him and produces a plate with toast and jam. “Eat this, so the ibuprofen doesn’t shred your stomach.”
I take the plate from him. My stomach roils at the thought of eating, but if I’m going to be able to force anything down it’d betoast. And I know from experience that the ibuprofen will do a number on my gut, tearing it apart and putting me off food for days if I don’t force something down now.
“Tha—thank you,” I say, thrown by how prepared he is.
I take a bite of the toast, the butteriness of it spreading throughout my mouth. And it helps. Not completely, but a little. The edge dulls. The tightness eases. My shoulders drop slightly.
“And here,” he says, gesturing to a bookshelf I hadn’t noticed before. It has a couple of bags on it that also seem new to this room.
He reaches into one of the bags, producing a bulky item.
He untangles a cord, plugs it into an outlet and hands the object to me, and it quickly becomes warm. “Heating pad,” he says, “Medium, but it’s got a bunch of settings so you can adjust it to what feels best.”
I lift my pajama top and press the plush pad to my abdomen. Heat seeps in, immediate. Relief starts to bloom under the surface. Not gone, but softer. More manageable.
My eyes drift closed for a second as the heat settles deeper into my body. Everything softening. Everything easing.
He grabs something else from the bag and hands me a little box covered in a plastic layer. “And here’s a device that’s meant to help as well.”
I read the writing. “A TENS machine? Oh wow, I’ve heard of these. They’re meant to help a lot. Tha—thank you. You didn’t need to do any of this.”
Past partners have barely gotten me a glass of water during my period, their mouths tight as they go through the motions of saying, “Can I get you anything?” Not daring to say it out loud, but making it very clear through their body language and general countenance that my debilitating, chronic illness is an inconvenience for them.
They’ve avoided me, hiding in the other room to watch sports or home renovation shows. Or insisting on cooking steaks and other pungent foods they justhadto have right then, despitemy obvious food aversion. The fact they’d had me running to the bathroom to expel the limited contents of my stomach didn’t seem to faze them.
But Soren is clearly different. Worlds apart.